


(you’re my) guiding light

by psalms



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Castiel is a star, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-23
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:55:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,717
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28252758
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/psalms/pseuds/psalms
Summary: Starlight, star brightFirst star I see tonightWish I may, wish I mightGrant me this wish I ask for tonight.ORSam makes a wish, Dean comes back, and a Star falls
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	(you’re my) guiding light

They were beginning to run out of places to look. Elbows deep in one of a kind tomes, eyes red rimmed from lack of sleep and the dust that they had stirred up pouring through the pages. Bobby sat back in his chair, his fingers resting atop a watered down and warm glass of whiskey. Sam, across from him, pressed his palms into his eyes, as he tried (but failed) to fight off a yawn.

It was very late.

Or…very early.

Either way the brassy rumble of Bobby’s voice that broke the silence of the house wasn’t surprising. “We should call it a night,” something in his back popped as he sat forward. Sam took in a slow breath of air, rolling his shoulders in a vain attempt to release the tension. Bobby was probably right, but as if he could read Sam’s hesitancy plain on his face the older hunter added, “we can look at this crap with fresh eyes tomorrow.”

He stood, glass in hand, and walked around the desk. He paused long enough to squeeze Sam’s shoulder before his footsteps retreated.

Sam wasn’t a child, and Bobby wouldn’t treat him as such. This wasn’t like his father who’s word was law, Bobby had offered his suggestion. Sam would be the exhausted idjit tomorrow if he ignored it. The half forgotten plate of food from dinner was still by his elbow, precariously balanced upon a stack of books with a sticky note reading “promising?” in Bobby’s handwriting.

Promising was far too generous. They had found jack shit so far, and the more they read the more helpless it seemed. Short of making another deal – which would become a useless cycle – there didn’t seem to be a way to retrieve a soul from hell.

With a sigh Sam rose to his feet, vision swimming for a moment as the heavy blanket of exhaustion draped itself across his broad shoulders. He carried the plate out of the study and into the kitchen, a silent war waging inside his chest. Dean wouldn’t stop. Dean wouldn’t rest. If Sam was the one who’s soul was trapped in hell Dean would work himself to the bone until he found a solution.

‘ _He would, sure and? What’s that have to do with anything you’re not Dean,_ ’ it was the side of the war that was winning. ‘ _Besides, will one day really make all that much difference?’_ No, it wouldn’t. Dean would be in hell tomorrow to the way their research was going. And the next day, and the next and –

Sam took in a lot of air, hands bracketing the sink, the curtain of his hair obscuring everything but the small stack of dishes that needed to get done.

Sleep. He needed sleep.

It was an easier decision that it should have been, but he was too tired to quibble about the morals of reality. His body was tired, his eyes were tired, his mind was overwhelmed by ancient texts that he and Bobby had been translating. Dean was dead.

That thought radiated through his body as he sank onto the bed. _Dean was dead_. It was a choice he had made, one he had had a year to deal with, and Sam had tried to get him out of the deal while he was alive. If Dean hadn’t been so god damn stubborn.

‘ _Bitch._ ’

Sam ran a large, calloused, hand across his face and willed away the phantom whisper of Dean’s voice as he sank into an uncomfortable sleep.

* * *

Eventually he had to go back out on the road, if only because being cooped up in Bobby’s was driving them both insane. “I’ll call if I find anything,” Bobby had promised as Sam had shifted the backpack on his shoulder. Dean’s keys – _his keys_ – were twirled around one finger as he gave a stiff nod.

He was two steps towards the impala when Bobby’s voice ran out again, “don’t get yourself killed, huh?” A half-smile tugged up Sam’s mouth as he pulled open the solid metal door and climbed inside.

An uneasy routine began after that. Bobby would call every couple of days with a fruitless _maybe_ and a more solid lead on a hunt. Sam threw himself into the hunts, and made his peace with the fact that there was nothing they could do. Dean was gone. Dean had made his own bed and had to lay in it. Life was moving on up here, and as much as he wished Dean was resting somewhere better there was nothing that he could do.

“There’s one thing,” Bobby’s voice said one night. The line crackled with the reverb of distance. Sam was well up in Maine, closer to Canada than the next state over, with the cool glass of a beer pressed to his lips. Even as far north as he was the heavy heat of the summer had made his shirt stick to his back. “It’s stupid bullshit,” Bobby’s voice had that note of hope to it. Hidden beneath the buff and gruff that coated every word out of the widower’s mouth. Sam knew that this meant more to Bobby than it did to him at this point. “Really it’s more of a throwaway line in a book of fairy tales but hell, you boys have hunted odder things,” there was a sigh and a shuffling of paper.

Sam took another sip of his beer as he waited, Bobby would get to his point eventually. There was no use in rushing him, it would only lead to a tongue lashing.

Finally there was an exhale, “here we go: wishing stars.” Sam didn’t hide the laugh that shook out of him in surprise. “I know, I told you it’s hokey bullshit, but just hear me out,” Bobby’s voice had an edge of amusement to it that kept a smile on Sam’s face. “Hell, I mean we’ve tried damn near everything else, what have you got to lose on looking silly in the middle of a field by yourself?”

“No, no, you’re right,” Sam agreed, leaning back in his chair, the last dredges of his beer rolled in the bottom of the bottle. “So what? Specific star you’ve got to wish on? Specific day? During an eclipse?”

There was the exasperated, _patented_ , Singer sigh he knew so well. “Would you like me to read it to you or keep guessing all night?” Not waiting for a response Bobby pushed on, “when I came across this I went back through to see if there was anything else, but as far as I can see this was a footnote on a footnote and nothing else.” The sound of Bobby’s chair groaning beneath him rang out over the phone as he shifted forward, Sam could just about see him in his mind’s eye.

“It says that in times of desperation, which I figure your idjit brother’s situation qualifies as, people would turn to the heavens. You have to give up a full day, eyes bound to keep them pure, or whatever bullshit this is trying to say. You have to find a field beside running water, close enough to hear, and stand in the dead center of it, until the witching hour when you can finally remove your blindfold. You’ve got to wish on the first star you see, it won’t work if you jitter around. Something about window to the soul, and your souls deepest desire, then it just has the usual rhyme every dummy knows,” the snap of a heavy book shutting broke Sam from his reverie.

Bobby’s voice wasn’t exactly soothing but the couple of beers were sitting warm in his stomach and he was tired. “Can you text me the exact phrasing in the book?” A palm rubbed against his eye, “I’m a long way off from you but I figure it shouldn’t be too terribly hard to find a place near here that meets those requirements.” It was a small thing, and when it didn’t work then maybe he could talk to Bobby about stopping the long shots. How it was getting to be too much, but one last time to humor Bobby couldn’t hurt. There was no blood needed, no spell seemingly cast, just time, and a star.

Bobby grunted in the affirmative about texting the information before he shooed Sam off the phone with some half-assed excuse about other work he had to do. It made Sam roll his eyes as he offered a soft, “yeah, sorry, bye Bobby.”

The motel bed was lumpy and seemed to swallow Sam the moment he sank into it.

* * *

His confidence the night before on the phone with Bobby quickly faded as he spent most of the next morning driving around and pausing whenever he found a moving body of water that seemed promising. Inevitably though he’d begin trudging through the field – estimating where the center would be – and the sound of the water would be too quiet. It took well into the evening, the sun beginning to set finally, for Sam to find one that seemed like just maybe it would work. If he shut his eyes tight and listened hard he could just hear the quiet rush of water off in the distance.

Sam made sure the stakes he’d picked up at a local hardware store were easy enough to feel as he tracked his way back to where he’d parked the impala. No sight would make finding the center of the field difficult without the guides, and he figured stakes were a less damaging solution than clear cutting a path through.

He made a mark of it on his map and then made his way back to the car…only to pause. He had to keep the blindfold on for a full day, which he and Bobby had talked about earlier and assumed had to mean a full sun rise-sun set cycle versus a precise twenty-four hours. The text predated that concept, anyways, but no matter how Sam tried to do the math it seemed like more effort than it was worth to drive back to town for only a few hours of sleep in the motel before he’d have to rush back.

“You better appreciate this, jerk,” he said to no one in particular as he climbed back into the impala and grabbed out the half-forgotten dinner he’d bought earlier. It, along with a bottle of water, were stashed in a cooler on the floor of the passenger seat. He settled against the hood of the car which was bordering on too hot from the sun it had sat in. His fork pushed the sad and soggy salad around, a sigh lifted his shoulders, head leaning back to stare at the quietly darkening sky.

At least the view wasn’t half bad, he pulled his phone out of his pocket and reception was too patchy for a phone call but his weather app declared tomorrow would be sunny, no chance of showers or clouds in sight. Which was good, he supposed. No worry about wasting more time in Maine than he had to. He dumped the few bites of salad out onto the ground and peeked at what was left in the cooler.

Another water bottle, a couple of protein bars, it wouldn’t be an exciting day of food tomorrow, but at least he had something. He sat on the passenger seat and toed out of his boots, tucking them away, before he climbed into the back seat of the impala. It was cramped, but not terribly uncomfortable, and the buzz of various night insects and cry of peepers waking up was as nice as any white noise machine he could’ve hoped for. Before he fell too hard asleep he pulled out the blindfold he’d found at a drugstore and turned the alarm he’d set up for both 3:25 and 3:33am on. The blindfold was one of those cheap things with dolled up eye lashes and some shoddy slogan slapped across it, and popped it over his eyes.

He crossed his arms across his chest, sighing as he settled back down. His mind rattled to a slow stop, thoughts quieting until there was only one left. No vision until tomorrow night? Sure.

Nothing could go wrong there.

* * *

In fact, nothing did go wrong, it was boring, but he had downloaded a couple of books on tape, managed to make the best of his situation. It wasn’t like there was anyone around to be embarrassed by. In fact the field he found seemed to be far enough away from any form of civilization that no other distant sound of a car could even be heard if he squinted.

It was difficult to tell how much time was passing, the best estimation was how the heat picked up until it was unbearable to remain in the impala. It was absolutely stifling even with all the windows down. The air thick with humidity and he was sure if he could see the horizon would be hazy with heat.

He wiped his forearm across his forehead. “You really better appreciate what I’m doing for you,” he reiterated aloud to the empty air around him.

Sam knew he’d maybe get a slap on the back from Dean in thanks if this did work, but more likely a laugh about how ridiculous he was sure Sam would look.

The asshole.

A guilty tug somewhere in his stomach stopped the thought from going any further. Dean was…well. He was Dean. He did what he thought was best, and acted the way he did because….

Well, _he was Dean_.

Sam sighed out his nose, the heat had begun to recede somewhat, and the faint shine of the sunlight he could feel on his face was fading. He swapped from the audiobook he’d stalled on. Fingers fumbling against the iPod, the click of its wheel echoing in his headphones, as he hoped he’d land on something solid music wise.

What came up when he finally pressed play wasn’t exactly what he’d wanted, but at least Dean wasn’t there to mock him or it.

He was somewhere closer to sleep when the first alarm finally sounded and roused him. He stood, on aching legs, and found the first marker he’d laid out. He carefully followed along, the tops of the stakes dragging along his palm. When he reached the final small cluster of stakes he spun himself in a small circle. The sound of the water was much clearer now.

When the second alarm rang he took a deep breath before fumbling away in his pocket to stop it.

With a steady hand he reached up to pull the eye mask off. His eyes still shut. It wasn't exactly nerves that rattled through him so much as a faint tug of conflict. And guilt as well. He wasn’t sure he was ready for Dean to come back. He wasn’t sure he _wanted_ Dean to come back.

He opened his eyes, and stared up at the North Star. The irony of which star his eyes had locked on wasn’t lost on him.

The whole sky almost burned against his sensitive eyes, he could feel the faintest pin pricks of tears beginning to form. The urge to blink rising, but he had to get the words off first.

Sam couldn’t shake how silly he felt saying them, “Starlight, star bright, first star I see tonight. Wish I may, wish I might, grant me this wish I ask for tonight.” A pause, his throat swallowing back the words he had to say. “My brother’s in hell, here’s there because the idiot tried to save me,” his eyes bore into the North Star, eyebrows dragging downward as if the star was to blame.

When in reality this was stupid, it was pointless, why had he wasted time when he could have been heading towards a new hunt.

“Bring him back, alright? I just… I want my brother back,” his shoulders slumped, eyes finally shutting as he blinked back the tears, rubbing at his eyes as if in relief.

In the few seconds Sam took to collect himself he missed the way the star twinkled ever so brighter, a faint blue shimmer casting over it, for just a moment.

**Author's Note:**

> hi, okay so look. this is my first supernatural fan fic ever, and my first fan fic i’ve written full stop in awhile so i hope it’s okay. i’m deep in the weeds over supernatural at the moment so... here we are. the rest of the chapter(s) (i'm not sure how many there will be, as i'm still editing it) should be up soon. so hang tight. i promise those repressed boys are coming.
> 
> i was, obviously, somewhat inspired by stardust, as well as the other amazing star!cas fics i’ve read. 
> 
> last little tidbit the title comes from “guiding light” by foy vance if you want to listen to it check out the live version from bangor abbey. the end of that song should qualify as a religious experience and the vibe felt fitting for this fic and the celestial little creature that castiel is.


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